On the reliability of usability testing – Kessner, Martin (2000).
Interesting paper sent to me by a friend, highlighting that usability testing has more variability than we might think. There is a discussion at the end where the author mentions the importance of understanding the tasks and other issues.
The full article is available for download at the ACM Digital Library for $15.oo.
Abstract
Six professional usability testing teams conducted a usability test on an early prototype of an open dialogue box for Windows applications. Altogether, they identified 36 unique usability problems. No problems were detected by all six teams [emphasis RP], 2 were found by five teams, 4 by four teams, 7 by three teams, 7 by two teams, and 18 problems were identified by one team only. In terms of the mean number of teams detecting a problem, there was more agreement among teams in this study compared to an earlier study and there was more agreement among the teams on severe vs. minor problems. Implications for the cooperation between usability testers and their clients are discussed.
Article by: Jonathan Rath
Image by: Katemangostar – Freepik.com
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